• invective •

Meaning: An abusive or profane denunciation, castigation, a railing condemnation.

Notes: This Good Word is quite versatile: it may be used as a mass noun (to heap on invective) or a count noun (a speech filled with invectives). It is also an adjective: invective language. This word is the noun from the verb inveigh, as to inveigh against the injustices of the world.

In Play: Save today's good word for outrageous railing: "Rather than suggest measures to reduce tensions in the office, Donny Brooks unleashed a torrent of invective about plots and conspiracies to undermine his authority." This is how today's word is used as a mass noun; it may also be used as a countable one: "Dad treated us all with a sermon, bristling with invectives against rap music."

Word History: Latin invehi "to attack with words, inveigh against", the passive form of invehere "to carry in", is based on in "in" + vehere "to carry", whose root is visible in the Latin borrowing vehicle. The root of the Latin verb came from an earlier Proto-Indo-European root wegh- "to carry (in a vehicle)". The same root ended up little changed in English weigh, referring to the movement of something in a balance scale. The semantic connection is clearer in wagon, a means of carrying, way, and Latin via "way, road", where wagons travel. Vex came to us from the same root in Latin vexare [vek-s-are] "to agitate", and originally meant to set someone in motion. The English derivatives wag and wiggle reflect the same semantic connection.

abbeylubber: Welcome to the post. Perry, who has also been on this forum for years, did not really need to apologize for Slava's remarks. We all, Perry included, try to get a little fun out of what we discuss. Wain is a lovely bucolic word. Are you familiar with the painting by John Constable of the hay wain? Constable is my favorite painter and his hay-wain is lovely.

I'm glad to get Slava's take on his posting name. Etymological kinship of words does not impress one definition of a word onto another. Slav may have meant the same as slave in the past, but it no longer does. My name may have meant lover of horses when it was first coined in Greek, but horses are not high on my list of things to love.